Scientists are already mobilizing to capture every ounce of data about the unusual occurrence, since it's the only display of its kind expected for at least 50 years.

Meteor showers occur when Earth passes through the dusty tail of comets orbiting the sun.

But unlike most of these light shows, which are caused by the trails of comets that loop around the sun in a couple hundred years, the Aurigids are castoffs from a so-called long-period comet that orbits the sun once every 2,000 years.